Sharp County record., 1887-11-24

| J
while we close the service with:
Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love.
The earth is dametered and clrcum-
ferenced with discord, and the music that
was rendered at the laying of the worlds
cornerstone, when the morning stars
sang together, is not heard now; and
thongh here and there, from this and that
part of society, and from this and that
part of the earth, there comes up THRILL
! ING solo of love, or warble OF worship,
or a sweet duet of patience, they are
drowned out by discord that shakes the
earth.
| Paul says:
| The whole creation groaneth.
And while the nightingale, and the wood
lark, and the canary, and the plover some'
times sing so sweetly that their notes
have been written out in musical nota-
tion, and it is found that the cuckoo sings in
the kew of D. and that the cormorant is
basso in the winged choir, yet sportsmen's
| gun and the autumnal blast often leave
them ruflsd and bleeding, or dead in
! meadow or forest. Paul was right, for the
groan in nature downs out the prime
donne of the sky.
Tartni, the great musical composer,
dreamed one night that he made con-
tract with Satan, the latter to be ever in
the composers service. But one night he
handed to Satin violin, on which Dla-
bolus played such sweet music that the
composer was awakened to the emotion
and tried to reproduce the sounds, and
therefrom was written Tartini'S most
famous piece, entitled the "Devips
Sonata" dream ingenious but faulty,
for all melody descends from Heaven, and
only discords ascend from hell. All
hatreds, feuds, controversies, back
billings and revenges are the DEVILS
sonata, are diabolic fugue, are de-
monac phantasy, are grand march OF
doom, are allegro of perdtion.
But if in this world things in general
are out of tune to our frail ear how much
more so to ears angelic and deific. 1t
takes skilled artist fully to appreciate
disagreement of sound. Many have no
capacity to detect defect of musical ex-
ecuton, and, though there was in one
bar as many otfenSes against harmony as
could crowd in between the lower f Of the
bass and the higher G of the soprano, it
would give them no discomfort, while on
the forehead of the educated artist beads
of perspiraton would stand out as re-
suit of the narrowing dissonance. While
an amateur was performing on piano
and had just struck the wrong chord,
John Sebastian Bach, the immortal COM
poser, entered the room, and the amateur
rose in embarrassment, and Bach rushed |
past the host, who stepped forward to
greet him, and before the keyboard had |
stopped vibrating, pat his adroit hand |
upon the keys changed the painful in
harmony into glorious cadence. Then |
Bach turned and gave salutation to the |
host who had invited him.
But the worst of all discords is moral |
discord. If society and the world are |
plainly discordant to imperfect man,
what must they be to a perfect God? |
People try to define what sin is. 1t seems |
to me that sin is getting out OF harmony |
with God, disagreement with His ho'i- |
ness, with His dignity, with His love, with |
His commands; our will c. flashing with His |
will, the finite dashing the infinite, the |
frail against the pussant, the created |
against the Creator. If a thousand mu-
scans with flute, and cornet-a piston. |
and trumpet, and violoncello, and baut-
boy, and trombone, and all the wind and |
stringed instruments that ever gathered |
in Dusseldorf jubilee should resolve that |
they would play out Of tune, and put con-
cord to the rack, and make the place wild |
with shreking, and grating and rasping |
sounds, they could not make such pan
demonium as that which RACES in a sinful |
soul when God listens to the play Of its |
thoughts, passions and emotions-discord, |
lifelong dscord, maddening discord. The
world pays more for discord than 1t does
for consonance. High prices have been
paid for music. One man gave S225 to
hear the Swedish songstress in New York,
and another 1925 to hear her in Boston,
and another $3.50 to hear her in Provi-
dence. Fabulous prices have been paid
for sweet sounds, but far more has been
paid for discord. The Crimean war cost
$l,700, 0000 and our American civil war
over $4,000 900 and the war debts of
professed Christian nations are about 3d.
000,O00,00O. The world pays for this red
ticket, which admits it to the saturnalia Of
broken bones, and death agonies, and de.
stroyed cities, and plowed graves, and
crushed hearts, any amount of money
Satan asks. Discord Discord!
But have to tell you that the song that
the morning stars sang together at the
laying of the worlds cornerstone is to be
resumed again. Mozart's greatest over
ture was composed one night when he
was several times overpowered with
sleep, and artists say they can tell
the places in the music where he was
falling asleep, and the places where he
awakened. So the overture Of the morn
ing stars, spoken Of in my text, has been
asleep, but it will awaken and be more
grandly rendered by the evening stars Of
the worlds existence than by the morn
ing stars, and the vespers will be sweeter
than the mathis The work of all good
men and women, and of all good churches,
and all reform associations, is to bring the
race back to the original harmony. The
rebellious heart to be attuned social life
to be attuned, commercial ethics to be at
tuned, ernationality to be attuned,
hemispheres to be attuned. But by what
force and in what way?
In olden times the chorsters had tun-
ing-fork with two prongs, and they would
strike it on the back of pew or music-rack,
and put it to the ear, and then start the
tune, and all the other voices would join.